Hard drive stays active and slows everything down

Hello all,

I'm having a very annoying problem with my computer. A couple of days ago, I noticed it was going a little slower than it usually did. Just yesterday, I noticed it was going a lot slower than it did. I saw that the hard drive light was constantly on even when the computer was idle. After countless restarts, nothing worked. I then found out that my hard drive had failed. After that, I bought a new one.

After restoring my computer to the new hard drive, I'm still having that same problem. My computer is still freezing and going really slow.

Within hours, the hard drive is acting like it's about to die. I checked on the disk tab in resource monitor and it's at 100% and staying at 100% and not going down for even a second. And it doesn't look like any programs are using the hard drive extensively. I'd also noticed that after 30 minutes that the hard drive light still wasn't going out.

I really don't know what the problem could be. The CPU usage is normal and so is the RAM usage. I don't know if it could even be the motherboard or even if I happened to buy a bad hard drive. I thought getting a new hard drive would fix this, but apparently it didn't.

Any help at all would be greatly appreciated. Again, this is a very annoying problem and a very huge inconvenience.

Edited by yosefu_kun_98, 10 March 2017 - 12:21 AM.

1. Run the task manager and check for unwanted application that are running in your background and close those applications. 

2. On the first tab, Processes in the  task manager, look for the Disk column. If you’re having problems with drive performance, this should be at 100%, and colored red to indicate whether you have a problem or not.

3. Scan your computer for a malware because a virus could be responsible for this. 

Which OS are you using in your computer??  

Edited by JohnAdam20, 10 March 2017 - 02:06 AM.

Please download MiniToolBox  , save it to your desktop and run it.
 
Checkmark the following checkboxes:
  List last 10 Event Viewer log
  List Installed Programs
  List Users, Partitions and Memory size.
 
Click Go and paste the content into your next post.
 
Also...please Publish a Snapshot using Speccy,  taking care to post the link of the snapshot in your next post.

   Go to Piriform's website, and download the free version on the left.  Click Download from Piriform.com (the FileHippo link requires an extra click). Or if you want to use a portable version of Speccy (which doesn't require installation), click the builds page link and download the portable version. You will now be asked where you want to save the file. The best place to put it is the Desktop, as it will be easy to find later.

    After the file finishes downloading, you are ready to run Speccy. If you downloaded the installer, simply double-click on it and follow the prompts until installation is complete. If you downloaded the portable version, you will need to unzip it before use. Right-click the ZIP file and click Extract all. Click Next. Open up the extracted folder and double-click on Speccy.
 
     Once inside Speccy, it will look similar to this (with your computer's specifications, of course):
 


     Now, at the top, click File > Publish Snapshot.

     Click Yes > then Copy to Clipboard

Now, once you are back in the forum topic you are posting in, click the ADD REPLY or REPLY TO THIS TOPIC button. Right-click in the empty space of the Reply box and click Paste. Then, click Add Reply below the Reply box.

Louis

Elsewhere, it was suggested the power supply was under-powering the hard-drive; I'm not sure if that is happening here, however, perhaps, consider having the power supply outputs checked.

Sorry for the late reply; my hard drive failed (again) before I could do any of this, so I'm just getting to this now.

Here are my specifications: http://speccy.piriform.com/results/qyEpbjhdcYXaB5LjzmAyYxu

Here are the contents from MiniToolBox:

Edited by hamluis, 16 March 2017 - 07:34 AM.

McAfee Validation Trust service running.

YTD Toolbar (Conduit) installed.

2GB RAM installed, minimal amount available, which may mean that virtual memory (hard drive) is being accessed frequently.

How Virtual Memory Works.

uTorrent installed.

All else looks pretty normal, IMO.  If this were my system, I would double the RAM installed...only 1 module is currently installed.

Louis

Your errors in Event Viewer re Search/Catalog Index are common.  See Aura's Fix .

Edited by hamluis, 16 March 2017 - 08:02 AM.

Looks like Louis is right about all above & that's a great suggestion by Aura that I've bookmarked for future reference.

It's not uncommon when a new HDD (as yours) are cloned, sometimes the software isn't perfect, or it was cloning an already messed up drive, in the state your old was in (this alone doesn't imply the HDD is bad, unless you conducted tests that proved otherwise). May want to run a test on the old drive with WD's diagnostic tool, which works on all brands of HDD's, if it passes, zero out (wipe) & use as a backup. A good metal enclosure is only $5 to $9 on eBay (any higher in price is too much). Please avoid plastic models, these retains too much heat during long usage & will corrupt any backups performed.

http://support.wdc.com/downloads.aspx?p=3

This is one of the exact enclosures that I have & use regularly (USB 3.0), just watch out for the small screws & don't over torque, otherwise will strip easily, I leaned the hard way, and had to use Locktite to secure the stripped screw, although the external still works fine.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Aluminium-2-5-USB-3-0-SATA-HDD-Hard-Drive-Disk-External-Case-Enclosure-Black-/301126481208?hash=item461c897538:g:XYIAAOSwl8NVWabG

If your computer has USB 2.0 output & likely does, then this one will do, have three of these, my oldest ones that still works fine today & best of all, no screws nor tools needed.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/2-5-Inch-Black-Sata-USB-2-0-Hard-Drive-HDD-Enclosure-External-Laptop-Disk-Case-/380885054137?hash=item58ae84b2b9:g:eQgAAOSwgZ1Xq6fR

Both are easy to put together, once you have the package open, it'll be seen how easy. The HDD goes in at a slight angle. 

Just make sure as noted above, to test the HDD first using the WD Diagnostics, the short test takes 2 minutes & the long will require much more time, although may be worth it if considering reusing for backup. You may want to delete existing partition(s) & create another, blank one prior to the test run, then zero out the drive, which wipes all of the data accumulated over the years & then create a partition for backup, all of which can be done with the WD tool, or Windows Disk Management (type (w/out the quotes) 'create and format hard disk partitions' & the option will usually popup after 'create and format', you can then click onto it to delete the old partitions. In some cases, MiniTool Partition Wizard (free version) is needed, if Disk Management won't delete the old System partition, or the WD tool may do the same. 

https://www.partitionwizard.com/free-partition-manager.html

Good Luck with your new drive, with a fast SATA-3 interface as shown by your Speccy link, your new can be reused in another computer when you decide it's the time to get another. Many times, the OEM's ships computers with slow 5400 rpm HDD's that's dirt slow, have been down that path several times with notebooks.

Cat